HOME NEWS SUMMARY.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXII, Issue 4646, 26 April 1902, Page 5 (Supplement)

HOME NEWS SUMMARY.

(From the “Spectator.”)

LONDON, March 8. IN THE REICHSTAG.

Count von Bulow made some important speeches in the Reichstag on Monday. The Government had been asked by the Budget Committee to withdraw the German troops—a whole brigade — now stationed at Tientsin, and to reduce still further the garrison of eight hundred men remaining at Shanghai, and the Chancellor refused. The troops at Tientsin were retained, he said, for political reasons, and especially to compel the clearance of the Pei-ho, as the waterway for German steamers between the sea and that inland port. The Government had not asked for exclusive concessions in Shantung, as reported by the “Times,” but c;.iy for concessions of railways, mines and the like; but China was a pudding, and though Germany wanted no extra slice, “she did ask for the same helping as the others get.” As to Shanghai, it was necessary to remain in force there in order to support tho friendly Southern Viceroys, and to preserve equality with other European nations there. Finally, as to the Anglo-Japanese treaty, though a great event, it did not signify to Germany, which held its rights on the Yangtse Kiang by the Anglo-German Convention of 1900. “What was legitimate for others in order to secure their commercial interests was legitimate for Germany, too, and particularly in Shanghai.” Clearly, Germany does not intend to rise from the Chinese dinner table nnfed.

GERMANY AND AMERICA.

In a subsequent debate on the same day, the Chancellor explained the visit of Prince Henry to America. It was not political, but Germany had bad good relations with the Union since the time of Frederick the Great, desired to maintain them, and watched “with lively interest the hospitable, chivalrous and splendid reception accorded by the American nation to the brother of the German Emperor.” Count yon Bulow evidently prefers ancient history to that which is recent, and finds in Frederick the Great —who having no fleet, was of course friendly to all transmarine peoples—a counterpoise to the German Admiral who interfered with Admiral Dewey in the harbour of Manila Wo do not, however, question his sincerity, for his real view was pithily expressed in the same debate by Dr Hasse, the Pan-German leader, who said, with frank cynicism: “The new, nation in America will become mightier than the Anglo-Saxons in Europe, and it is therefore German business to live in peace and friendship with that nation.” We should like to have heard the speech Count von Bulow would have made if Spain had beaten the Union. America would then, we fancy, have been described as the Power which France had aided into existence, and which, therefore, could hardly expect from Germans anything but watchfulness.

THE FRENCH PREMIER.

M. Waldeck-Rousseau met with a severe accident on Friday week, his carriage being overturned by an electric tramcar. Ho was thrown out, his shoulder injured, and his face and hands terribly cut by the broken glass. Most fortunately, the injuries were not dangerous, though they have laid up the Premier for ten days; but the accident spread an emotion of alarm throughout France, and indeed all Europe. Frenchmen when in grave mood are capable of strong admiration for a man who unites probity with strength of will; and a warm popular regard has fixed itself upon the French Premier as a man who, though sincerely Republican and able to tolerate even Socialists when they are reasonable, is determined to maintain order, even if, as in the case of Montceati-les-Mines, he has to move a corps d’armee to secure it. The peasantry believe in him as well as the artisans, the elections will be fought in a sense in his name, and it was felt that if at such a juncture he had disappearod from the scene the political consequences might haye been most disastrous. Frenchmen are never tranquil until they can see a man at the head of affairs. ' '

WILL GERMANY ABSORB HOLLAND?

The Vienna correspondent of the “Times,” a man of remarkable keenness of judgment, published on Thursday a careful analysis of a book just issued by Professor von Halle, under the title of “Volks-und-Seewirthschaft,” which may attract much political attention. It is, in fact, a long pamphlet intended to tell Germans that they must press, and if necessary force,- the Dutch to enter the German Empire, with all their colonies, beginning, of course, with a union of Customs and a treaty of alliance, which must be of a strict kind, enabling Germany to insist on her ally putting herself in a better position of defence. He affirms that the cause of Germany’s failure to become a great sea Power is the position of Holland at the mouth of the great German river, which mouth she refuses to improve. She, in fact, draws her sustenance from German labour, yet refuses to share German _ burdens, preferring to occupy a position in which in time of war she might be a positive danger to the stronger State. He bids the Dutch distrust English assurances of protection, which have always ended in taking her colonies, and promises her, if she will agree with Germany, to give her support which will enable her to avoid the fate of Manila and Santiago. The Professor concludes by advocating energetic means of pressure, such as differential rates for Dutch goods sent hy'rail through Germany, which would, he observes, greatly interfere with Dutch commerce. That advice is closely in accord with the old Prussian idea that the way to make a dependant love yon is to thrash him well.

FRENCH SOCIALISM.

The Socialists of France, who are at all events so strong that M. WaldeokRousseau earnestly desires their adhesion at the elections, have published their programme. Much of it is strictly Collectivist, and will not shock Englishmen as it shocks most Frenchmen, hut the cloven foot of doctrinaire tyranny peeps out here and there. All duties, they urge, upon articles of prime necessity should be abolished—as they are here—and the income tax should bo progressive—like our own succession duties. They further ask for one day of rest in seven—which we enjoy—that the legal working day should be of eight hours—debated here this week, and only rejected by a majority of one and that no woman should be employed in night work —quite a defensible, though probably impracticable, proposal. It would extinguish nursing, among other trades. They seek also a national system of insurance, which if our workmen were wise would be law by this time; and they repudiate not

only standing armies, but war itself, except in pure defence, which as a counsel of perfection is right enough. But then they also demand that the State shall provide cheap residences; that a minimum wage shall bo fixed by law; that certain classes of employers shall be “placed on the Index”; that mines, banks, railways and sugar refineries shall become national property : and that, though education is to be free, no priest shall open a school or become a teacher in one. The entire programme is penetrated with the French passion for equality, and reminds us of Walter Bagohot’s description of Socialism: “No man shall go barefoot; every man shall have one boot.”

THE BRITISH ARMY-

On Tuesday Mr Brodrick, in introducing the Army Estimates, outlined one of the boldest and most comprehensive schemes of army reform ever presented to Parliament. He proposes to meet the recruiting difficulty by raising the pay of the soldier and lowering the period of service. Henceforth the soldier in all branches of the service will enlist for three years, and—except just while he is doing his recruit drills —will receive a full shilling a day and “all found.” That is, all stoppages are to be abolished, and the soldier will have the shilling a day to save or spend. As our readers know, that is a reform which we Have pleaded in season and out of season for the past five years. But three-year men cannot, it is held, bo sent to India. Therefore, when a man has served two_ years he will have the choice of finishing his three years and going into the reserve for nine, or else of agreeing to complete eight years with the colours. If _he re-en-gages, his pay will at once rise to one shilling and sixpence a day—provided ho is a fair shot; if not, and until he makes himself so, he will only get an extra fourpence. The opening of enlistment for the three years’ period will begin on April Ist, as also will the clear shilling a day. The offer of one shilling and sixpence a day to the two year men will begin on April Ist, 1904. The cost will be roughly a million a year extra to this country, and £BOO,OOO a year to India. We have dealt with the whole subject elsewhere, and will only say here that we believe Mr Brodrick’s new scheme to be thoroughly sound.’ It will, we believe, get ns the fifty thousand recruits a year, it will content the soldier, and it will give us a reserve of over oifb hundred and seventy thousand men—a matter of very great importance.

FURTHER PROPOSALS.

Another important point in Mr Bredrick’s programme is the proposed formation of reserves for the . volunteers, the Yeomanry and the Militia. The Volunteer Reserve is to be formed from among men with four years’ service, who will undertake to shoot their course once in two years. £No details are given, but we hope that a due regard will be given to elasticity.]] The Yeomanry Reserve will contain in it five thousand men, who in consideration of a £5 bounty, will register for foreign service if required. Another important item is the strengthening of the Militia Artillery and Engineering branches, and encouragement of education among Militia officers. A general scheme of Imperial defence is to be submitted to the representatives of the colonies who will be in London during the Coronation. Among the miscellaneous reforms proposed are those relating to the Medical and Nursing Departments, and measures for reducing the expenses entailed on officers on entering the army.

CONCERNING REMOUNTS.

We may note that in the early part of his speech Mr Brodriok defended his department in regard to the remounts. To a certain extent we agree with Mr Brodrick’s plea that 1 when a department which in normal years bought only two thousand five hundred horses a year was suddenly required to buy a hundred and fifty thousand, mistakes were bound to be made. •Of course they were, but that does not excuse the War Office for not having,- at any rate, accumulated the knowledge of where horses could be procured in large numbers, who were the- dealers most likely t)o help them, and who could be got to inspect them. Apparently, the Remount Department was organised not on the supposition that war might occur, and that war meant a huge demand for horses, but on the Hibernian supposition that the War Office was a permanent,-peace .department. For such want of foresight there can be no excuse. Why, even a daily newspaper regards war as a possibility, and makes arrangements beforehand for buying the vast extra stocks of paper it will require should war break out. Mr Brodrick, we are glad to note, quotes Lord Kitchener as saying that ho has now sixteen thousand horses in the depots. We take it that the secret of the horse fiasco is really to be found in the fact that a horse out of condition is no horse, and that though we sent good enough horses to the front per se, they were always out of condition. However great the clamour, horses should not have sent away from the depots till they were in condition. Till then they should have been treated as no horses. The results of serving them out to the troops out of condition and not serving them out at all were practically the same. The horse out of condition for the most part died before he was of any real use in the military sense.

THE SUGAR BOUNTIES.

On Thursday the full text of the Convention by which the signatory Powers agree to abolish all bounties on sugar was published at Brussels. Under it the British Government is bound, on and after September Ist, 1903, to impose countervailing duties on all bounty-fed sugar. In addition to the pledge to apply countervailing duties, we agree that while the Convention lasts we will not give any preference to sugars from our own Colonial Empire. The Convention, it should be added, need not be ratified till February in next year. Like all instruments of this nature, time alone can show its practical working. We confess that we do not like the Convention as far as it binds this country, but we are not so prejudiced that we cannot see its good points. We are glad that the colonies should receive the benefit they receive under the treaty, and we are also glad that the foreign taxpayer should be relieved. At the same time, we deeply regret—and tSis regret is, in our opinion, predominant —that we should have infringed the principle which is the mother principle of free-trade and far more comprehensive, namely, that our ports and markets, except for revenue needs, shall be open to all traders, and that they shall be able to sell their wares in them without let or hindrance. The benefits of the free markets are unquestionably infringed by the Convention. No doubt the fact that sugar is now off the free list makes this argument less cogent than it was, but it still, in our opinion, should rule the case. Lastly,

wo do not feel at all sure that the West Indies will obtain the benefit they expect. True, the. piece of meat has been thrown in their direction, but we are not certain it may not be seized on by another dog. The West Indies and the other British colonies are not the only places in the world that grow cane sugar.

IMPERIAL LIBERALISM ATTACKED.

Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman was the principal guest at a dinner given by the National Liberal Club on Wednesday, and made some uncompromising references to the newly established Liberal League. “The staff officers have already been gazetted—by what authority I know not—alunough the troops are not yet in sight.” “This is a new society of politicians, working on parallel lines for identical objects; and if so, I will ask why in the name of sense they don’t work with us.” Sir Hemy, who declared that he was bewildered by this uncalled-for new departure, repudiated the idea that there were any personal differences at the present moment, but declared that all this talk about programmes and “concentration” was sheer nonsense. Earlier in Ms speech Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman gave a burlesque version of the Government’s acMevements, in wMch be summed up their idea of the hour’s necessity in two lines:— “Take learning, morals, trade and health away, But save, oh save onr weekly holiday.’ As against Sir Henry’s parody, we axe glad of the excuse wMch it gives us for again referring to Burke’s weighty defence of the “week-end” given in our correspondence columns last week. “They,” he tells us, “who always labour can have no true judgment,” and he then enumerates the evil “effects of unremitted labour, when men exhaust their attention, bum out their candles, and axe left in the daxk. Halo meorum negligentiam quam istorum obscuram diligentiam.”

CONCENTRATION CAMPS.

When the question of the concentration camps came up again on Tuesday, Mr Chamberlain observed that never before had a belligerent force attempted to worst the enemy by exposing its own women and 'children to famine and suffering. He quoted the testimony of a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church and of a Wesleyan missionary as to the kindness and humanity shown to the Boer inmates. The usual infant mortality in Cape Colony was 214 per 1000; hence, of the 15,000 deaths in the camps, very much less than half might be attributed to abnormal circumstances —notably the epidemic) of measles. The expenses were enormous —at tho rate of £2,500,000 a year—but it was duo, to the fact that they were keeping people at the expense of the British taxpayer whose own fathers and brothers and sons would not take charge of them. Mr Chamberlain also dwelt on the gratuitous work of education being carried on in the camps, and made the gratifying announcement that the latest figures of child mortality in the camps of the Orange River Colony had fallen from 550 per 1000 in December to between 70 and 80 last week.

BRISTOL’S BID FOR TRADE.

Bristol enjoyed on Wednesday a day which may prove to be of importance to her commercial history. Her iiUr portanoe depends upon her trade ,wi6n America and tho West Indies, .-om it has been checked by inadequate dock accommodation. The docks B-t Avonmonth, though formerly'reputed largo, will not hold the of 12,000 tong and upwards,--“'which are now belieyed to pay sJid. t-ho cost of onlarging then: sufficiently was so great that the citizens, who are their own dock-owners, at first shrank from the pecuniary risk. They have now, however, stiffened their backs, the money has been raised, the land has been acquired, and on Wednesday the Prince and Princess of Wales witnessed, amidst immense crowds, of delighted people, the removal of the first boatload of soil. The work is to be finished in four years—room has been left for still further extensions —and Bristol hopes to regain some at least of her ancient supremacy in American trade. The effort, which is a great one. is thoroughly characteristic of our people, who are just as strenuous when gain is in view in the South as in the North, and so, we may add, was the hearty welcome accorded to the Prince and Princess. Philosophers may criticise, .but the people like to see the family which is their centre take a hearty interest in their business affairs.